


they're talking about you boy (but you're still the same)

by sweetlikesugar



Series: Pack Writing [9]
Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Character Study, Class Issues, Discrimination, Gen, Homophobic Language, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Joseph Kavinsky-centric, Mild Blood, Minor Violence, Xenophobia, this is a very specific fic for my very specific feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-10
Updated: 2020-03-10
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:14:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23094646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sweetlikesugar/pseuds/sweetlikesugar
Summary: Blending in with the Aglionby crowd was never an option, not when they decided who he was before they’ve even seen him. They heard his last name and thoughtRussian moband all he can say isBulgarian, actually, you yankee piece of shit.
Relationships: Joseph Kavinsky & Adam Parrish, Joseph Kavinsky & Prokopenko, Minor or Background Relationship(s), Richard Gansey III & Adam Parrish
Series: Pack Writing [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/723645
Comments: 7
Kudos: 34





	they're talking about you boy (but you're still the same)

**Author's Note:**

> i'll pepper in the fact i made [ K's playlist](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5c0OIlWpHCDbnwoilUvLnI?si=i2ic_SsUTROZZTjE3g-uvQ)

Joseph Kavinsky according to his father: good for nothing piece of shit, faggot bastard waste of space.

* * *

Joseph Kavinsky is sixteen and he’s not the one with a broken nose this time. 

He spits blood on the pavement between his feet and tongues along his teeth to check if any of them are moving. None of them are. Lucky.

He watches James--Jake? Mark?--try to breathe through his nose that K bent out of shape with his fist. He didn’t start this fight but it never mattered before so it won’t matter now.

The boy is ushered to the nurse’s office and K is whisked to an office. He spits blood again.

The adults are talking but K isn’t listening, because the insults are still ringing in his ears, a vicious loop of _Russian mob motherfucker with a commie whore mother._

Joseph Kavinsky is sixteen and he smiles with a bloody mouth.

* * *

  
  


Joseph Kavinsky is twelve and his words are too sharp around the edges. They’re too fragmented, full of sounds that _are there_ but they also aren’t, they don’t flow like they’re supposed to and he doesn’t know how to make them. 

He knows everyone can understand him _(“Your English is so good!”)._ But it doesn’t matter when he sounds a bit too flat, when it takes a bit too long to feel the shape of an unfamiliar word in his mouth before he can speak it into existence. 

He reads a lot. But it doesn’t matter when he has to say a word he’s only ever seen on paper and it doesn’t come out right. Someone snickers.

Joseph Kavinsky is twelve and it doesn’t matter that he’s smart.

* * *

  
  


Proko is nice. K likes him a lot. He likes the way Proko’s eyes lit up when K rolled his name in his mouth with ease, likes how Proko sounds sharp, flat and loose in the same way K does. 

When Proko speaks on the phone K savors the sound of his voice and the ebb and flow of his speech just close enough to K’s home to find it familiar. So Proko talks and K answers, and it’s not a perfect communication, it’s not even very good, but it makes something pulse warmly behind their sternums and that’s enough.

* * *

Joseph Kavinsky according to his mother:

* * *

K’s father finds them. He always does.

Late at night, when he lays in bed more pain than a person and he hears his father stomp around the house like a hurricane, K thinks he might’ve craved for a piece of his home a bit too much when he finds himself comforted by the ebb and flow of his father’s voice spitting abuse.

* * *

  
  


“You speak Russian, right?”.

“No”.

K had this conversation too many times. 

“But your surname is Russian”.

“I’m Bulgarian”.

“Same thing--”.

Joseph Kavinsky has a split lip, but the other guy has a broken collarbone and cracked ribs. 

* * *

Joseph Kavinsky according to fellow Aglionby students: Bulgarian mobster piece of trash, Russian mafia arms dealer, that Russian kid who killed his father and drugs his mother, classless waste of space, mail-a-bride kid, junkie, Russian mob smuggler--

* * *

K comes to Aglionby with a reputation other people have built for him. He doesn’t have to say anything. Everyone is already talking. 

There’s nothing else for him to do than give people their money’s worth.

At first, they think it’s a front. A suit of armor. A role he plays in order to be someone in a place like Aglionby, where money doesn’t matter because everyone has it. It’s not.

His pride is real and so is the confidence in his walk when all American Money kids look at him half-judgemental and half-awed. He’s the worst Bulgaria has to offer and he loves it, claims it, and makes it his. 

Surrender is never an option for kids like Kavinsky. (For Russian mobsters, commie gangbangers, for kids from the “same thing, really” countries).

_Bulgarian mob piece of shit_ and what of it? _Commie motherfucker_ and yet here you are, asking for another fix, coming to another party.

Blending in with the Aglionby crowd was never an option, not when they decided who he was before they’ve even seen him. They heard his last name and thought _Russian mob_ and all he can say is _Bulgarian, actually, you yankee piece of shit._

In a world of old American money, K’s most daring crime is taking pride in his existence. 

So he’s filled with a specific kind of rage when he sees Parrish take the knee, tucking away the lazy soft lilt in his voice, trying to walk and talk like Dick and Co. Trying to fool everyone he’s just like them. It pisses K off to see Parrish take it all quietly when they’re both aware Parrish will never fit in as well as he wants to.

It’s a specific kind of rage when Parrish refuses to be rich America’s worst nightmare.

* * *

  
  


K only knows how to be loud. After a lifetime of being quiet, being loud is an act of defiance. They will see him. They have no choice. 

When Carruthers makes a passing comment about K’s mother and mail-a-bride, K stops breathing. Carruthers is lucky that K left the Dream Killer in the car because that’s the only reason he’s still alive, barely, because K knows how to do terrible things with just his fists.

He spits a spray of blood when they drag him off Carruthers because he got a lucky hit at K’s mouth and made him bite his tongue. 

He looks at Parrish, blood dripping down his chin.

_This is what you are to them,_ he snarls wordlessly, ignoring Dick wincing in disgust right next to Parrish. _This is what you’ll always be to them._

Parrish doesn’t seem to get the message.

* * *

Joseph Kavinsky is eighteen and his sounds aren’t as sharp anymore. They’re still a bit flat, they roll peculiarly sometimes, especially when he’s not paying attention, he still has to pause before an unfamiliar word, but he lost the cutting lilt he carried from home. 

His grasp on words falters. He knows what he means but when he opens his mouth nothing comes out. 

He and Proko talk in the syrupy sharp drawl of their homes just to listen to it. K blasts his music from his car parked along with the old American money and watches rich boys wince and roll their eyes. He doesn’t understand all the lyrics but he sings along anyway.

* * *

Lynch is at his party. Somewhere. Lynch is at his party, and Gansey pulled up to pick him up, and Parrish tagged along, and his life is a sitcom. 

Gansey eyes the crowd like he could see Lynch through the mass of bodies this dense.

“Blow your dog whistle” Proko smiles, wide and boozy. “He’ll come if you whistle”.

“He’ll come, alright” K snickers and watches Gansey frown at the crude comment.

“Why so quiet, Parrish?” K grins. “I wanna hear that _honey southern drawl”_ he lays his own accent thick, too thick, and Proko laughs behind him. 

Parrish clenches his jaw, subtly furious.

_Oh_ , K thinks, _he didn’t get the joke._

“Fuck off” when Parrish speaks it’s sanitized and practiced.

K scowls.

_Fuck,_ he thinks, watching Gansey’s hideous car drive away with more occupants than it arrived with, _he’s one of them._

* * *

Joseph Kavinsky according to Richard Gansey: a drug-dealing thug, a doesn’t matter, ruined beyond saving.

* * *

K doesn’t try to find Parrish. Their conversation at the party told K everything he needed to know. So when he rounds a corner and walks straight into Parrish, making him drop all his books they’re both confused.

“Whoops,” K grins, watching Parrish scoop his books off the ground. Second hand. His uniform too. K has a brand new one somewhere in the house. He’s never worn it but he knows it fits like a dream. 

Parrish says nothing but glares something fierce. All that fire wasted on Dick and Co. Tragic. 

Parrish moves to walk around him and K speaks without thinking. 

“You know they won’t respect you anyway, right?”.

Parrish turns around.

“No matter what you do” K raises his eyebrows. “You’re never good enough for them. You’re never like them”.

“Not like you are?” Parrish spits.

K laughs, loud and harsh. “Parrish, did you even hear what they say about me? I lost the game before I even started playing. And so did you. Because to old money, Parrish, you’re trailer trash forever. Even in an Armani suit and a fancy law school diploma you’re a scholarship trailer park scum”.

Parrish stares, but he’s quiet now and that’s enough for K.

“To them, we’re the same” he grins. “Dickie boy may have taken you in as his pet project on poverty, but you’ll never be his equal”.

Parrish is _this_ close to snarling.

“So if you can’t be proud of it, southern belle, then you better learn that quick”.

* * *

Joseph Kavinsky according to Joseph Kavinsky: Bulgaria’s best dream thief, an American nightmare. 

**Author's Note:**

> this is a very specific fic about very specific experiences but i was seized by a sudden need. if there's anyone from bulgaria that feels the need to correct me in any way i'm more than happy to listen  
> leave kudos and comments if you enjoyed and hit me up on [ tumblr](https://mindlesslittlefreak.tumblr.com) or [ twitter](https://twitter.com/raccoon_dad)


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